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Friday, January 16, 2015

Tom Björklund is an artist and illustrator presently living in Espoo, southern Finland. Besides art, he is passionate about nature and history, influence of which is visible in his work. He digitally paints these stunningly realistic wildlife with such detail and precision that one'll need a second take to realize that these are not real but are paintings. He has won several awards such as the Bjorn Kurten Prize in 2011 for his amazing work, and the Public Information Award in 2010.

The process of paintings usually start as a traditional pencil drawing and then thin strokes of colors are added onto a painting layer by layer which is the most time consuming work. The technique of applying patterned brushstrokes does not interfere with the painting, instead add dimension giving a painting 3D effect. For creating his paintings he uses a software called ArtRage. Tom Björklund shares: "I’ve been using ArtRage for my professional work practically from the beginning...Actually, my commissioners and my audience have hardly noticed that I have changed media from traditional to digital."

You can learn more about him and his exceptional work through his interview that he gave to ArtRage, here. If you feel inspired then visit his his blog for a detailed tutorial on how he painted his eagle owl chick (shown above).

You can view traditional and digital artwork by Tom Björklund on DeviantART. I bet you won't be able to spot any difference between the two.